What is Leprosy?
Leprosy, known since biblical times, also called Hansen’s disease, is a chronic infectious disease that affects the peripheral nerves, skin, upper respiratory tract, eyes and nasal mucosa. It causes skin sores that are disfiguring, nerve damage and muscle weakness that gets worse over time.
Caused by the Bacterium; Mycobacterium leprae, was discovered by G.A. Hansen in Norway in 1873. There are 2 types of leprosy: tuberculoid leprosy and lepromatous leprosy. Tuberculoid leprosy is the less severe and less contagious. Lepromatous leprosy is the more severe and is more contagious. This type affects the organs such as kidneys, testicles, eyes and nose.
Leprosy is difficult to study, Mycobacterium Leprae multiplies slowly and symptoms can take as long as 20 years to appear. Armadillos are the only animal other than humans that have been found to become naturally infected by this disease. (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/001347.htm)
History of Leprosy
Leprosy was recognized in the ancient civilizations of China, Egypt and India. The first known written mention of leprosy is dated 600 BC. Throughout history, the afflicted have often been ostracized by their communities and families.
Starting in the Middle Ages, a rise in a transition from leper colonies to leper hospitals, was being treated by churches. St. James Leper hospital opened in 1118 by Queen Muad (a consort of Henry I), Hospital of St. Nicholas opened in 1084. The ideas in medieval religious society embodied that it was a noble thing to build relationships with the leper. Run by monastics, the lepers were encouraged to live monastic life styles for their health as well as quarantine. Because the suffering of a leper was viewed as Pu...
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...ead to erectile dysfunction and infertility. Leprosy in more severe cases can also damage the kidneys which can lead to kidney failure.
Most Interesting
That after treatment, life can be mostly normal.
Support Groups www.hansensdisease.org www.leprosymission.org www.leprosy.org www.dailystrength.org/c/Leprosy/support-group
References
Ernst JD. Leprosy (Hansen's disease). In: Goldman L, Ausiello D, eds. Cecil Medicine. 24th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Saunders Elsevier; 2011:chap 334. http://familydoctor.org/familydoctor/en/diseases-conditions/leprosy http://plaza.ufl.edu/bjb1221/colonies.htm
Renault CA, Ernst JD. Mycobacterium leprae. In: Mandell GL, Bennett JE, Dolin R, eds. Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases. 7th ed. Philadelphia, Pa: Elsevier Churchill Livingstone; 2009:chap 251.
http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/leprosy/research/Pages/Default.aspx
In 1348, religious authorities determined that the immodest behavior of certain groups led to outbreaks of ubiquitous plague. The tendency to regard indecency as the cause of plague is displayed in records of the day. Henry Knighton’s description of a guilty crowd attending the tournaments is a telling example. He laments that, “they spent and wasted their goods, and (according to the common report) abused their bodies in wantonness and scurrilous licentiousness. They neither feared God nor blushed at the criticism of the people, but took the marriage bond lightly and were deaf to the demands of modesty” (130). As one can gather from this passage, the 1348 religi...
...such as extreme spiritual austerities can hold their place in history because they mattered to the people who practiced them, not necessarily because they were an agent for driving change. Bynum rejects morally absolutist reconstructions of the past in favour of a more relativistic reading which delves into the imagination and subconscious of the medieval writers themselves. She meets them, as much as possible, in their own milieu rather than projecting modern constructions (such as ‘anorexia nervosa’) into the past where they serve little use in our understanding of the medieval mind. Despite her close work with the Annalist School, Bynum makes no attempt toward ‘l’Histoire Totale’ or some grand narrative of the past, and in this regard the work is most honest, thought-provoking, and definitive for 21st century scholars studying the medieval mind and its times.
Before the Tuskegee Experiment in 1926, there was a major health problem and it was syphilis. Then in 1932 the Tuskegee experiment begins. The research took place in the city of Tuskegee, Macon County, Alabama. Where poverty and no opportunity was the main problem for African-
After the plague in the city of Halesowen, “82% of the plague-vacated holdings were taken up by new tenants within the year.” For those young, new people, the plague gave rise to opportunities to fit into the privileged tenant class. “However, the recurring outbreaks of the plague reminded survivors that all earthly delights will inevitably come to an end. Images in churches functioned to remind people of their own perishability.”...
In the sixteenth century France was mainly a farming country. People lived in small communities and rarely died in a town other than where they were born (Gildea 42). Family life was quit simple, men married when they inherited land from their fathers or if a women’s family had land to give him. Women were around the ages of twenty-six to twenty seven when they married, men where a bit older. Family’s usually lived all together, grandparents, cousin; all under one roof. A woman had about six kids and it was understood that about half of the children would die in the first three years of life (Davis 65). Life was not sanitary and there was really no type of real medicines. A typical day consisted of getting up when the sun rose and going to work in the fields and everyone helped. Women and their children worked just as long as all the men did. When the sun went down it was time to go back to the house and eat a meal of bread, beer, and sometimes vegetables. Meat was eaten on very rare occasions, maybe only twice a year. Bedtime was soon after the sun went down. This was the routine everyday. All of the villages had a church, which kept precise records of all births and deaths. Most of the churches were Cathol...
James Parkinson. It’s not certain how long the disease has existed but its probably been around
Signs and Symptoms of Active Tuberculosis Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MT) is a slender, rod-shaped, aerobic bacillus which causes tuberculosis. Tuberculosis (TB) is an airborn infection which is transmitted via inhaling droplet nuclei circulating in the air. These droplets are expelled from the respiratory secretion of people who have active TB through coughing, sneezing, and talking (Porth, 2011). Some bacilli stay in the upper airway and are swept out by mucus-secreting goblet cells and cilia on the surface of the airway.
Unknown, Discover Staff. 1996. "The origin of Syphilis." Discover. October. Vol. 17, n10, pg23 (3)
The history of Syphilis itself is one tangled and wrapped up in the histories of other diseases, social movements, and sciences. To...
Pathogens are a type of microorganism that spreads viral and bacterial diseases. These diseases when present in human blood and body fluids are known as blood borne pathogens, and can spread from one person to another. (Worcester polytechnic institute) The most serious types of blood borne diseases are the hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV), which can cause liver damage; and HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), which is responsible for causing AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome). The blood borne pathogens can be spread when the blood or body fluids (semen, vaginal fluid, breast milk, and amniotic fluid) of an infected individual comes into contact with mucous membranes or an open sore or cut on the skin of another person. Mucus membranes are located in the eyes, nose, mouth, and other areas as well. ("Bloodborne pathogens: MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia") Two of the most common ways that pathogens are transmitted is through the exchange of fluids during sexual intercourse or by sharing infected IV needles. (Worcester polytechnic institute)
of Europe was destroyed. The disease causes swelling of the lymph glands (up to the size
globally spread. The symptoms of this illness are quite defined and are very recognizable. Cause
Syphylis is an STD caused by bacteria in an open wound (Dugdale). Many people believed that the alignment of the stars and planets was the reason he got syphilis. Other people thought it was a new type of plague (Smith). Syphilis is contagious and many people think he got it from one of his six wives. Pregnant women with syphilis have a high chance of miscarriages or stillborns, this is why people think that he got it from one of his wives (“Syphilis”). It is also believed that Henry could have had the gout (Brown). Gout is a disease that targets men in the age range of 40-50 years. This disease causes pain and swelling in the toes and feet (“Go ask Alice”). Henry died in 1547 due to the gout and syphilis, which they classified as a brain disease and made him very aggressive
Tuberculosis is transmitted by inhalation of aerosols containing the tubercle bacilli. The required inoculum size for infection is usually high, but easily occurs with exposure to a patient who is currently infected. The products of dried aerosols, droplet nuclei, are particularly infectious because they remain in the air for an extended time, and upon inhalation easily move to the alveoli. The severe damage related to infection is caused by the reaction of the host. The tuberculosis infection has two phases, primary and secondary.
The Church in the 1400’s was the center of everyone’s life and a peasant’s life was the hardest to live. The Church convinced everyone that if they broke the rules their soul would be damned. One of the rules was to devote time to the church where peasants would give hours of free labor in the churches’ fields instead of working on their own land to feed their family (“The Medieval Church”). The Church would gather tithes of food and money from every person and store them in a tithe barn where the food would rot or be poisoned by rats (“The Medieval Church”).